Raytheon wins support award for NASA training facilities

Raytheon Co. will provide operations, engineering and software support for NASA under a new five-year contract from the space agency worth as much as $120 million.

Under the award, Raytheon Technical Services Company LLC (RTSC), a Raytheon subsidiary, will provide support facilities and operations support for astronaut training at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) and Sonny Carter Training Facility in Houston.

Specifically, RTSC will operate, maintain and perform engineering services for equipment and software used at the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory and Space Vehicle Mockup Facility.

RTSC has approximately 70 employees supporting the NASA laboratory and the mockup facility, operations that provide zero-gravity or partial-gravity training to astronauts in Space Shuttle and International Space Station programs, Raytheon said today in a news release.

In addition to astronaut training, the Space Vehicle Mockup Facility supports other engineering activities at the JSC.

The contract begins Oct. 1, 2010, and ends Sept. 30, 2015, if all options are exercised.

Raytheon Co., of Waltham, Mass., ranks No. 4 on Washington Technology’s 2010 Top 100 list of the largest federal government contractors.